Naturally, It can't always be day when f*orces fight! So when you want to have a more unique scenario, you can decide to have your f*orces fight during the nighttime.

Rolling for night--

At the beginning of each game, roll 2D6.If the total is even, it is a day battle.If the total is odd, it is a night battle.

Alternately, you can just decide it is day/night.

Morning/nightfall (optional)--

After you have rolled to see if it is day/night, you can also roll 1D6 to see after how many turns it'll be morning/nightfall, at which the time shifts, day becoming night or vice versa.

Night--

When a battle is at night all units get 1/3 cover. This tends to make battles a bit more interesting as well as much longer, since it is harder to spot targets, especially when they are in cover. (The 1/3 cover bonus does not apply when the attacker has a CC Weapon)

Night can be represented by dimming the lights in the room, for maximum authenticity. (Unless the person you're playing with is a or something like that)

Lights--

Minifigs and other units can be equipped with lighting systems, which can help negate the skill penalty.

Vehicle-based lighting systems (I.E. Headlights, etc) 5CP +1D6 to skill (effectively negating night penalties) (Only if the vehicle is firing in the direction of the light)

Searchlight 10CP Searchlights can "spot" one unit per turn. When a unit has been spotted, all units firing at it get +2D6 to skill. (only when there is night) However, any units firing upon the unit with a searchlight get the +2D6 to skill as well.

Fire-Based light (I.E. Torches, bonfires, raging infernos, flamethrower victims, etc) +2CP (If not caused by a fire weapon) gives everyone within 1D6 (per turn) inches +2 to skill, but it also gives anyone firing upon them the +2 to skill.

Naturally, in order to use a lighting system, the minifig/unit needs some indication of the lighting system.

Rather than getting a skill bonus from carrying a light source, you should just keep track of who's in light (treated as normal) and who's in shadow (penalties to ranged attacks but probably less or no penalty for close combat). That way it doesn't matter who's holding the flashlight, what matters is who the flashlight's pointing at.

A skill penalty for CC seems silly, it is not as if you go blind you can identify bodies perfectly well at night when they are standing next to you at night.

What about giving everybody a simplified version of the stealth rules? This would also make it more realistic as it would provide scenarios where you don't see the enemy.In RM version they can see and spot each other perfectly fine they just have a hard time hitting each other which seems silly because the reason it is hard to shoot somebody in the dark is because you don't know where they are. Once you do know where they are, even when they are just a silhouette, it isn't that hard anymore to shoot them.

*CRAZYHORSE* wrote:Once you do know where they are, even when they are just a silhouette, it isn't that hard anymore to shoot them.

Have you ever gone night shooting? I would have thought the same as you, but once you actually try it you realize there's a big difference. Stationary targets aren't that much harder to shoot, although you trend to blind yourself with the muzzle flash on every shot. Moving targets are way, way tougher. There's like this weird tenth of a second delay while your brain tries to process motion in a low light situation. Not enough that you notice it under normal circumstances, but when you're trying to shoot somebody it throws all your timing off. Bad enough if they're moving in a steady direction; if they're moving unpredictably it's even worse.

I like these rules a lot, but also agree that your skill bonuses are a bit intense. I would focus more on making the rules so that units are simply either in cover from shadows, or that they are not. Adding bonuses from pointing lights at guys seems silly, because it's suddenly much easier to shoot a lighted object at night than the same object during the day. In fact, those extra die rolls probably only slow the game down. My suggestion is to change lighting so that it works in either a cone (such as from a spotlight, headlamp, or bulls-eye lantern), or circles of varying radii (flashbang grenades, campfires, etc.). Units who are illuminated lose their cover, and that's that. Oh, and anyone smoking anything definitely loses their cover.

Something you COULD potentially incorporate is blindness/stunning, so that if a minifig is hit with a bright enough light source (flashbang, spotlights, pretty much any light source larger than 1"), they lose their action for the next turn, instead spending it to rub their eyes and say "jesus somebody put that thing out."